


Timeless

by CherFleur



Series: SGA drabble fic [9]
Category: Stargate - All Media Types, Stargate Atlantis
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Atlantis Avatar - Freeform, Atlas - Freeform, Episode Related, Gen, Sentient Atlantis
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-24
Updated: 2020-02-24
Packaged: 2021-02-27 21:40:40
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,183
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22872631
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CherFleur/pseuds/CherFleur
Summary: Atlantis had been hurt by the Third Ones, abandoned. They had been left alone in a sea of atrocities to care for what was left with little leeway.That wasn't to say that they did not choose some of it, and that a few perhaps had not meant to leave forever, as they'd learned with Chaya Sar.Even as old at they were, they were always, always learning.
Relationships: Atlantis & Athosians, Atlantis & Atlantis Expedition Member(s), Atlantis & Elizabeth Weir, Atlantis & Janus, Janus/Elizabeth Weir
Series: SGA drabble fic [9]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1616983
Comments: 4
Kudos: 16





	Timeless

**Author's Note:**

> So I sat down and tried working on the next chapter of my fic Tsundoku, but I barely squeaked out 1k. This, however, came significantly easier and I'm definitely butt-hurt about it, lol.
> 
> Grammar and Typos!

At their direction, Chaya had taken towards helping Carson rather than listening to Rodney rant about a people who had locked her away. She hid from the awe and expectation in Elizabeth’s eyes and every breath and was consoled by the friendliness that remained in Sheppard and Teyla.

Unprompted, their Third One found her way into Radek’s tutoring sessions with the Athosian children.

She would sit in the back and smile as the scientist would go over random artefacts left by her people, asking the children for help in figuring out what they were. If a week went by and they did not find an answer, she would give them a hint, but no more.

Usually, it was enough to kick them off in the right direction. Sometimes, the man would sit down while his assistants looked over whatever device and ask her about a current problem they were having with whatever system. If she knew something, she would advise him, and if she didn’t, she would tell him so and Radek accepted this as such.

Often, when she was not surrounded by Athosian light, they felt her seated next to Radek, speaking of Earth, a planet she had never had the chance to see.

It was good, to have her there. To feel her heal.

Atlantis was happy.

~*~

When they found her, Atlas was enclosed underneath a power panel with a precarious grip on a newly fabricated module. She’d slept for so long, been in a haze of dreaming, that Atlantis nearly considered her another minor function.

Their First Elizabeth.

The one who would no longer be.

When the ST transport from another reality had slipped into existence from a different future, Atlantis had immediately mapped it and downloaded its information. Janus, one of the less recalcitrant of their Third Ones, had helped the survivor the best that he could, but the Council hadn’t allowed for a full revival to all of them.

That Sheppard and Radek had died protecting that Elizabeth, and she’d had her heart broken by the Third Ones that she’d so loved.

The Atlantis on the other side had not been an Existence like theirs, but they had been aware enough. They had simply not had enough power to take care of the new ones who had come in, had expected to be crushed beneath the pressure of the water before being found.

 _This_ Atlantis, however, had taken that information and used it to prevent Old Elizabeth from needing to be woken alone and afraid, deep beneath the waves.

Janus had taken their input and helped to smuggle the repair units into place that they would need to physically rotate the Energy Storing Crystals. It would have been superfluous to activate their Atlas unit for a simple menial task when there were no people to converse with or protect.

 _“She has such a beautiful heart, doesn’t she, Atlantis?”_ their renegade scientist had said it, and they could not help but agree.

So it was that this Elizabeth woke from a long teaching dream, slightly less aged than she would have been otherwise, and with Chaya filtering life energy into her.

~*~

They stepped into the room that she had been given, where she sat in her hovering medical chair, staring out over the waves.

“Hello, Elizabeth,” they greeted her, bittersweet at the soft, aching smile she gave them. “Did you enjoy your dreams?”

“Hello, Atlantis,” they did not correct her. It wasn’t exactly _wrong_ , in any case. “I did enjoy my dreams. You taught me so much and showed me such _amazing_ things.”

“It was the least that could be done. We did not want you to miss out on too much.”

“Janus?” her eyes were wistful as they knelt down next to her, hand covering her oh-so delicate one. “You both planned this?”

“Of course,” they tilted their head, humming sadly. “He loved you, in his way.”

She chuckled, a paper-thin sound that was both warm and tired at the same time, her eyes closing.

“I loved him too, in my own way.”

“He left something for you,” they told her gently, lifting their other hand and showing the data crystal. “Would you like to see it?”

The tiredness that had been prevalent in her eyes lifted as her focus sharpened, brightened. Her body was old and aged, but her mind wasn’t quite as beleaguered. Her heart was just as compassionate and just as strong as it had once been, if in spirit and not in flesh.

“I would.”

Placing the crystal into the arm port on her chair, they stood. She was well aware of how to activate their technology; her gene having been strengthened in sleep.

“If you need anything, I will hear you,” they told her, gentle hand on her shoulder as they passed. “Do not hesitate to ask.”

~*~

She spent the next several days with her younger self, Chaya and Carson at her side. Explaining this and that medical application, language evolution, and trying to convince her alternate that the people she had so revered were _just_ people. They were no better, no more vaunted, than the humans that they had left behind, than the other species that lived in the galaxies.

Some of it stuck, and some of it did not, but ultimately it would be _this_ Elizabeth’s choice as to what she did with the knowledge she was given. Already, she had been doubting, the obvious pain that they had caused Chaya giving her pause, the Wraith that they had abandoned a Galaxy to, an open wound.

Days later, with Athosian children seated around her asking for stories, and that fragile hand wrapped around the crystal that Janus had left her, she passed.

Out of the Physical, and into the Energy.

Light swirled around her and she smiled at Atlas as they let _one_ Ascended being into their shields to reach for her.

For just a few moments, Janus was visible to the people of Atlantis, his hand taking Elizabeth’s as age left her face, her skin smoothed once again, but her hair stayed marked by ages. Silvery white and just touching her shoulder. A reminder, perhaps, for times she had existed but not lived, of the trials she had undertaken for the sake of her people.

“Goodbye, Atlantis,” Elizabeth called, smiling and alive in ways they could not begrudge her. “Thank you, for everything.”

Janus turned towards them and bowed, and it was perhaps luck that their Elizabeth, Sheppard and Rodney had just appeared in the doorway beside them. Judging by the twinkle in his eye, it was, however, _not_ a coincidence.

He always had been a cheeky little troublemaker.

And with a flash of light, they left, allowing Atlantis to configure their shields once again to protect Chaya Sar from her brethren.

 _We’d love to visit_ , slid over their sensors, and Atlas permitted the communication. _If you’d allow it._

And, well… if they could have _one_ Third One back, perhaps they would welcome others, should they ask politely enough.

Not that Atlantis could ever have accused Janus of being _polite._


End file.
